Wikipedia:Templates for deletion/Template:Infobox Biography

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The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the template below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the template's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result of the debate was keep according to AzaToth. Vít Zvánovec 19:22, 18 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Template:Infobox Biography

Template:Infobox Biography (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs)
Delete — This template is simply ugly, an oversized box that adds nothing to the page. Information on name, date of birth and death is already the first pieces of information on the article itself, so it adds no useful content. Regular old photos is all that's needed. Underwent TLD in the past, survived, but many, many people were upset by the decision. Now that it's spreading to other articles it needs to be stopped. DreamGuy 07:04, 7 January 2006 (UTC)

Comment As nominator, you didn't add the tfd notice to the template itself (step 1 of the instructions at the top of the page here). I've added it there for you. Slambo (Speak) 02:46, 9 January 2006 (UTC)
Reply Step one says to put in the template or ont he talk page. If you have a problem with that, take it up with whomever wrote the instructions and not me. DreamGuy 11:30, 9 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete SatuSuro 07:29, 7 January 2006 (UTC)
Sounds like pushing things a bit. That was the argument last time. I'm transcluding this page so we don't keep rehashing the same argument each time. - Ta bu shi da yu 10:14, 9 January 2006 (UTC)
  • The previous discussion is here. —Cryptic (talk) 07:07, 7 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep – It's a very nice accent to a page that gives the reader a good image of the person they're reading about in their older years or their youth. the box is also similar to something you'd see at a funeral, which is fitting. --Rsdio 09:14, 10 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Very Strong Keep. Template is far from ugly, far from a distraction, and is already becoming a WikiStandard. --CJ Marsicano 07:24, 7 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep. This issue has already been discussed. The template is also in heavy use: about 50 articles use it. If you find the template ugly, please be bold and improve it in any way you can. The authors of these article (not TfD) should decide themselves which templates to use.--Fenice 07:31, 7 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep, enables editors to move (generally) unimportant details like the day and month of birth out of the first sentence but still allows them to be found quickly. Especially useful for subjects who were born and died in different countries. Kappa 07:34, 7 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep, per Kappa and others. Can't sleep, clown will eat me 07:36, 7 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete, not too useful, duplicates info already in text, suggests that place of birth is more important than anything. --Golbez 07:43, 7 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete Pointless decoration, duplicating what ought to be in the text, mostly in the very first sentence. Users whose attention span is too short to get through the first sentence might want to get their information elsewhere. --Calton | Talk 08:26, 7 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep - obviously. Possibly block the nominator for his spamming campaign. -- Netoholic @ 08:32, 7 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete, per reasons given above. Needless. — TheKMantalk 08:37, 7 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete. We don't need infoboxes in biographies, except possibly for popes, kings and other exceptional cases (and I'm not entirely convinced about that either). u p p l a n d 09:10, 7 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete: This is a useless ugly distraction from the main text. It merely duplicates what should be written in the lead, although some of these boxes lately seem to carry so much information the article become unnecessary. Get rid of the aesthetically hideous blight once and for all. I'm not here because I was spammed, its been stuck on my watch list since the last attempt to clean the place up.Giano | talk 09:16, 7 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete. This template is used very infrequently in comparison to the number of biographical articles, which shows that it is little valued by the community. User:Noisy | Talk 10:23, 7 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete. To reiterate what I said last time, the result of deletion will be that biographies will use normal tools to put an image up rather than a template, and so will be encouraged to shape the article, images and so on to fit the needs of the subject rather than shoehorning it all into potentially irrelevant templates. — ciphergoth 11:38, 7 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Strong delete - Unneccessary, just reproducing text that should be in the lead and a photograph that can be added normally. Totally pointless. --Cactus.man ✍ 11:50, 7 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete. Template spamming. / Peter Isotalo 12:14, 7 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete - totally redundant. Not only does it create a large, clunky, box full of information that is already contained in the first line of the biography, but it places all of this duplicated information right next to... the first line of the biography. I don't think we need to be hitting readers with information in stereo before they've even scanned past the first paragraph. It adds nothing to the article, and aesthetically it detracts a lot, particularly in articles that have a short lead section because the box overlaps into the next section (examples Buddy Holly, Helen Keller) and even two sections (example Henri Becquerel). Rossrs 12:19, 7 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep, and enhance Just as country articles have infoboxes (rooted in a template) that summatively provide information regarding them, which are not at all obviated by any sort of lead, so should articles about notable people have bioboxes. Even fictional characters in certain genres have (different) bioboxes. A la dictionaries, (even) refine the template/infobox to include (only) top-level notions uniform amongst all Homo sapiens: dates of birth/death, places of birth/death, nationality, primary function/position/occupation. However, such a box should not contain predecessors and successors for any sort of office/position (which are often accommodated for in footer templates). And nothing more; otherwise, it would get unwieldy and redundant. And as a prior TfD occurred a scant three months ago (without consensus to delete), it's this TfD that is rather redundant. E Pluribus Anthony 12:25, 7 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete: It is redundant, and when lives become uniform, then "important features" can become uniform. Until then, boxes like this mess up existing formatting, duplicate material already present (a deletion reason), and, unfortunately, lead to edit wars, as original authors get "bold" and remove them and box fanatics get "bold" and insist that there is no option: it must be in, that it is "standard," that it makes everything look exactly the same and that's good, and that all we can do is "improve the box," but not remove the box. If box authors put this in biographies that they themselves had written, you'd never see this level of opposition, but, of course, they go to featured articles where someone else has done the research, found the pictures, and done the formatting and then destroy it all by introducing redundancy and "improving" with an infobyte. Geogre 12:29, 7 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep: I learned about this TfD from a spam on someone's page. ℬastique▼parℓer♥voir♑ 13:36, 7 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep, but with qualifications. I don't like the template much, and in some cases (Benito Mussolini) a more specialized template would be more appropriate. I also don't appreciate having my talk page spammed; as I've never touched the template in question this falls under the category of solicitation. Ah well, such is life. So yes, keep, but try not to use it. Mackensen (talk) 15:00, 7 January 2006 (UTC)
  • STRONG Keep - This template even has snap on accessory templates IIRC, and is used in a large number of articles. Deleting it will force some large amount of work on someone or another, to fix all those articles up, that could instead be spent on new articles or useful improvements to things. To the charge that it is large and ugly, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. It seems similar in size to other infoboxes I have used (see American Bridge Company which uses {{Infobox Company}} or Poughkeepsie Bridge which uses {{Infobox Bridge}}). To the charge that it repeats info in the lead sentence, a LOT of infoboxes do that, I don't see it as a bad thing. I am not even really sure why this was proposed for deletion actually. I watch TfD so would have seen this but I saw it sooner thanks to it being on someone else's talk page... that seems harmless. ++Lar: t/c 15:36, 7 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete for redundancy with the lead. It just isn't useful. Tuf-Kat 16:03, 7 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep for the argument against causing people to do extra cleanup work. However, this vote is strongly premised on retaining its use as an optional feature. I have written many bios, but do not use the Box for some of the reasons above. Hal Jespersen 16:52, 7 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete. Useless, redundant. Varizer 17:00, 7 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete as per nom. Worthless. Dustimagic 18:17, 7 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete - adds nothing to articles except a sense that they've been dumbed down. Worldtraveller 18:33, 7 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep, useful and popular template. No reason to handcuff editors by deleting this. Christopher Parham (talk) 20:14, 7 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Strong Delete - it adds NOTHING to the article. Nothing. I have always been against this template; it's useless. --Matjlav(talk) 20:17, 7 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep This was nominated previously and survived then. I don't see why it should be deleted now. Slambo (Speak) 21:58, 7 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep, and *fD is not a good place to attempt to make sweeping changes to style guidelines. rspeer / ɹəədsɹ 22:15, 7 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete Completely uneeded as mentioned above. MechBrowman 02:11, 8 January 2006 (UTC)
  • delete - an unwanted eyesore. Fawcett5 05:56, 8 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete. Needlessly repeats information that should be included in the article's introduction. Also, ugly. android79 05:59, 8 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete as per my resons on the previous TfD. Unneeded, duplicates info whioch should be in the lead or in the text of an early paragraph. There is no style guideline on the use or non-use of this box -- if ther were there would be no need for this debate, at least not in this form. DES (talk) 07:01, 8 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete. needless. --Pamri • Talk 08:37, 8 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete, same reasons as last time around. —Charles P. (Mirv) 15:43, 8 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete for same reason as last time. JYolkowski // talk 19:30, 8 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete. Does not further the aims of the encyclopedia known as Wikipedia. Repeats information that should already be mentioned in the intro paragraphs (i.e. a few inches to the left) if significant, and should not have to be mentioned near the top of the article at all if it's not significant (i.e. the exact place where these people were born and died). Needless consumption of space, needless overstandardization, needless overboxation. No credible encyclopedia wouldn't do anything as ridiculous as this, so why should we? This is the sort of thing you see in high school textbooks and baseball cards, not in credible academic resources. Plus it's such a fixture of attention and debate all throughout Wikipedia that it draws much-needed attention away from the article text itself; people have spent so much time arguing back and forth over this silly template over so many hundreds of articles, when all of that time could have instead been spent on improving the text of the actual articles. That's what Wikipedia's about, in the end: cold, hard, solid paragraphs of textual information, not all the bells and whistles, all the elaborate boxes and pretty designs and lists. And I love the bells and whistles!! I'm a layout nut. But this just isn't necessary, in any way, shape, or form, on any article. It's just too patronizing, too unencyclopedic, and, above all else, too redundant. -Silence 23:30, 8 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep and enhance. A variation is used on many of the biographies of philosophers - see FI David Hume. Usualy I hate unnecessary navigation tools, but this one is potentialy useful. Banno 00:54, 9 January 2006 (UTC)
  • And that variation used on the biographies of various philosophers is without a doubt the worst thing to ever happen to those articles. If that template is ever nominated for Deletion, I'll give it my biggest "DELETE" vote ever; it's even worse than this one, by far. Truly a horrible, tragic, wasteful, and ridiculous template, if there ever was one. Until the day that scourge of a template is removed from Wikipedia, I'm on strike from improving any articles that use it, even though I'm a huge fan of western philosophers. There are some things that a person simply cannot stand for lest his human dignity be forever eroded; boxes like that are among them. Whether this one is deleted or not, that one certainly needs to be. -Silence 08:43, 9 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep for reasons give by Fenice. And, if you think it's ugly, improve it. That is what Wiki is about, not deleting things you don't like. --Falcorian | Talk 03:23, 9 January 2006 (UTC)
It's not just ugly but totally pointless. If I decided to add random circle graphics for no reason to tons of articles, would you like it if I said, "well, if you don't like a circle, make it some other geometric shape spread all over articles for no reason"? No, of course not. Wikipedia is making an encyclopedia, which means getting rid of crap like this that has no reason whatsoever to exist, other than for a few box-happy people to lie about and claim it is supported as policy and shove it in everywhere. DreamGuy 11:28, 9 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep. It's nice to have that information in a standard, table form instead of having to wade through text for it, especially if it has info not in the intro. It could be made more attractive, but something like it definitely has a place.--ragesoss 04:53, 9 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete. Unnecessary. Postdlf 05:45, 9 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete. Not needed. Mrwojo 06:11, 9 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Conditional Keep - It's useful for articles where the subject is deceased. I find it easier in writing header paragraphs which include info on birth and death places. --LBMixPro<Speak|on|it!> 06:33, 9 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete. Utterly pointless. --Saboteur 09:27, 9 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete, ditto. – Ham 11:19, 9 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep this is the SECOND time it has been listed. - Ta bu shi da yu 10:13, 9 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Comment Yes, yes it is, but so what? It did not have consensus to be kept last time. If there is no consensus it's pretty silly to try to portray that as consensus to keep, especially when the vote was as close as it was last time. The way things are set up anyone can make anything and then sneak it in on articles and try to portray it as having broad support (as someone tried to claim to me when they started inserting it across articles on my watchlist) when it has no such thing, just not quite ENOUGH support to get rid of it. That's a completely backassward way to do things, you should only do something like this if it has full consensus to actually do, not just because enough people weren't brought together to oppose it. It's horrible way to run anything. So we vote again hoping for a clear consensus. That's the only reasonable thing to do. DreamGuy 11:28, 9 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep It usefully sets up the essentials of a subject.Why is so much of wikipedia full of useles arguments anyway?.Gareth E Kegg 13:01, 9 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Strong Keep. I do not see any change in the situation since my previous vote and hence, I do not see any reason to change my vote. --Gurubrahma 14:59, 9 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Strong Keep. I can't believe a template as popular as this has been nominated for deletion - this is pathetic. It's not harming anyone, its not ugly, its not large! I'm fed up of these stupid nominations! — Wackymacs 19:00, 9 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep. The template is widely used and looks just fine in my opinion. Hall Monitor 19:30, 9 January 2006 (UTC)
  • redesign or delete Exceptionally ugly template that in its current form defaces articles. There is arguably a need for a well designed template, but this version is hideously ugly in the extreme. Given the amount of design talent on WP, is this monstrosity the best we can come up with? Surely not. FearÉIREANN\(caint) 20:18, 9 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Strong Keep and Enhance - This template is very useful as it gives a user a quick glance about the subject's birth date/city/country, death date/city/country. It works very well as a quick overview of a subject. Yes it's information that is in some bios but remember, not all Wiki bios contain everything. I've come across so many Wikipedia bio articles where the subject's death date or city or country isn't even clearly written in the article and is only available in the infobox. And some subject's birth or death dates/city/country isn't even written in the article. Believe it or not, I've seen such articles. I would suggest enhancing the biobox to include nationality, occupation, etc. If it's ugly, then someone should improve on it, not delete it. --speedoflight | talk to me 20:37, 9 January 2006 (UTC)
  • very strong keep, only because this has been discussed before, and the result was to keep it. Mac Domhnaill 21:42, 9 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Very strong keep Rama's Arrow 22:01, 9 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep template is concise, useful, and aesthetically pleasing. -- MisterHand 23:02, 9 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete. Use {{Infobox Celebrity}} instead. - David Björklund (talk) 23:43, 9 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete. Ditto to Golbez. RexNL 23:55, 9 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep – I've edited it so perhaps it works/looks a little better now. — Seven Days » talk 00:58, 10 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Strong Keep, Haven't we have faced this kind of dispute before?, Come on guys, it is silly to be just foolishing around and just stating, I am going to delete this template because is ugly, What kind of statement is that? this is silly. My proposal is this template should be enhanced and improved, i find it usefull on articles.--HappyApple 03:43, 10 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete. Redundant and ugly. Fredrik | tc 04:48, 10 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Strong Keep Because:
    • 1) Ugliness and beauty are subjective. There is not a scientific criterion to decide if something is beautiful or not.
    • 2) 237 articles use it! If it is so useless, why are there so many artices with it???
    • 3) Many serious books use such things to give fast informationabout the biography.
    • 4) It is not at all a distraction, and is very useful to standarize the information that every biography should have.
    • 5) An article/template/etc should not be listed for deletion twice! Even if the first time there was no consensus.
    • 6) If you think this article is ugly, simply change it!
Eynar Oxartum 05:08, 10 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Strong delete. A student, for instance, would not be inconvenienced by having to look at the first sentence to find out the person's dates of birth and death (the locations are optional anyways), and would certainly not be inconvenienced by having to look in the infobox's current location to see a photo or portrait of the person. On the other hand, having an infobox for a country is much more handy, because it would take much longer to find out the country's currency, for example, in the absence of an infobox – the reader would likely have to find the Economy section and look for some mention of the currency there. If the intention is to have an infobox for every article at Wikipedia, then may I suggest Wikidata? Before deleting this template, the information given for its parameters should be moved to a more appropriate place in each article. – Minh Nguyễn (talk, contribs) 08:59, 10 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete gives redundant information, has ruined many good articles. Quaque (talk • contribs) 11:59, 10 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Strong delete. -- Vít Zvánovec 15:45, 10 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep ugliness is subjective, usefulness is objective. If over 200 articles use it, it means it is actually useful. --Angelo 16:46, 10 January 2006 (UTC)
    • No, that means it is used. Usefulness is also subjective. I find it useless. android79 17:08, 10 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Strong keep -- Subjective reasons for deletion; box could provide handy "flash card" information for younger and home-schooled Wiki users; provides handy and quick visual detailing for those who might need it. David Hoag 20:26, 10 January 2006 (UTC)
  • STRONG KEEP for all of the same reasons that were brought up the last time this was nominated as a TfD.--Lordkinbote 20:42, 10 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Strong delete. Briefly: it's too big, it highlights trivial facts (merely because they're easy to standardize), it is inflexible. Much better to simply use the caption feature, which allows the authors to highlight truly meaningful information, which will be different for every subject. The number of times this template appears is meaningless, because this box is often simply imposed on articles by people who did no prior substantive work on a particular biography. -- PRiis 21:13, 10 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep. Seems harmless. There's no law that says you have to use it if you don't want. Sdedeo (tips) 21:49, 10 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep. More articles are currently used with this infobox. Why does it happen all the time? Adnghiem501 23:01, 10 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete. I'm falling out of favor of infoboxes in general. --tomf688{talk} 01:36, 11 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep - The Cooper template adds some good info about his birth and death. It is something that deserves to be kept, maybe add some info like DreamGuy says but don't delete it. Thistheman 06:18, 11 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete. Too big, too useless. --Hn 07:59, 11 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep. I love the theory of infoboxes, and think they do have a place for biographical information. Perhaps it could be expanded upon to include other information like a date of birth, nationality, and other quick information. This way people could get an overview on the individual before having to dive in to the article to find what they are looking for. I'd also cut down on the size of the photography a bit. --Toddbloom7 11:36, 11 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep. I like it, it's great for getting the most important information at a glance, and it's nice to have a standardised form for that. Oliphaunt 12:22, 11 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Strong Keep Do we have to have this discussion every couple months? This template should be kept until someone comes up with a new argument to delete it. The complaints ir should be redesigned should be met by redesigning it, not by this waste of time. Septentrionalis 18:54, 11 January 2006 (UTC)
    • Better yet, write a small version as an alternative. Give people a choice. If it is better, it will sweep this one out of Wikipedia. Isn't that the Wiki way? Septentrionalis 22:21, 11 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep. D. Wo. 22:36, 11 January 2006 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Kcar1986 (talk • contribs) Adnghiem501 02:01, 12 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep and enhance. Add a few more items to it. Its a good template and there needs to be one for non-Presidents or heads of states.--KrossTalk 01:46, 12 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Strong keep - Infoboxes provide a standard template for representing important information. From the simple standpoint of usability, it is easier to draw information from an infobox than a paragraph (no matter how prominent the information may be in that paragraph). If you feel there is some extra information that could fit in the infobox that is standard to most biographies, improve the infobox. If you don't like the infobox, don't use it in your article. However it is poor form to nominate a template as popular for this (200+ articles) for deletion. Cedars 02:33, 12 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep, dammit. Phoenix2 05:36, 12 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep. This template is a very useful visual aid to an article, since (like all templates) it filters relevant information out of the article into a separate box. If it's too big, then by all means resize it, but don't delete it altogether. Aecis Mr. Mojo risin' 14:36, 12 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete dammit. Ugly like Mother Love and overtemplatization. - Darwinek 14:40, 12 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Strong Keep - this is just getting silly - I don't like your template so I'll recommend it for deletion. We need creativity to add to the blandness of text, we need templates to give a common look and feel to articles of similar subject matter. Ok if this is not a good style or content improv it provide or something better. Oh let's not do that when we can get the current one deleted for no good reason and we'll just get on each other nerves. :: Kevinalewis : please contact me on my Talk Page : 17:16, 12 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Strong Keep Arguments to remove entirely subjective. CaptainCarrot 18:02, 12 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep of course. Halibutt 03:08, 13 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete--the template is already suggesting to people some form of inappropriate standardization. It's one thing to use a template for a particular field. But the information that matters most for one figure will not be the same as it will be for another. Keep specific ones, but delete the general one. Chick Bowen 16:32, 13 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep, Sometimes the biobox is useful for containing other information, such as Post-Nominal honors and titles which tend to clutter up intro sentences. If you don't like it, don't use it. If you see it in an article and it bothers you, remove it. It may start an edit war, but it will make you feel better and that's what Wikipedia is all about right? Ugliness is in the eye of the beholder. I don't think asthetics, superficial matters qualify as a valid reason for delteting anything.--R.D.H. (Ghost In The Machine) 14:07, 14 January 2006 (UTC)
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the template's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.